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In just a few weeks, the UK’s Government Digital Service (GDS) has lost its head, its deputy, its strategy man, its chief designer, its head of user research and its delivery and performance chief.

There seems to be a mix of messages coming out of Whitehall – some talk about the plan always being to devolve the central GDS team into newly-prepared departments (a question of tackling transformation at the correct scale) and others seem to suggest a November spending review is curtailing a GDS that is losing an argument with some of its vocal critics.

I don’t know anything about the machinations of governments but in a broader context it’s pertinent to remind ourselves that momentum doesn’t always gather behind transformation projects.